EMC Advised to Drop Documentum
March 26, 2014
Is this another flame-out in the world of enterprise content management systems? The Register has some fun with words as it reports, “Humdrum Documentum Momentum Makes EMC Glum? Off Alone into the Scrum it Should Be Spun.” Analysis firm 451 Research advises EMC to sell or spin off its Information Intelligence Group (IIG), parent of data platform Documentum. In his impact report, analyst Alan Pelz-Sharpe writes:
“At 451 Research, we believe it’s time for EMC to divorce itself of IIG, a product division that never really fit into EMC as a whole, and has continued to disappoint CEO Joe Tucci. There are two very good companies here, the storage and cloud giant EMC, and the business application wannabe IIG, aka Documentum. Both groups are trying to do the right thing, but find themselves pulling in different directions.”
Register writer Chris Mellor adds that competitors like Alfresco, IBM’s FileNet, and OpenText (there’s a chart for that one) seem to be leaving Documentum in the dust. Pelz-Sharpe asserts that setting IIG free would motivate them to rejuvenate their brand, while removing a business application division from EMC—a company he says is about application infrastructure, not applications themselves.
Cynthia Murrell, March 26, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
The Observatory of Economic Complexity
March 26, 2014
The future of search may just be here, in the form of a specialized search engine courtesy of MIT (quelle surprise!) The Observatory of Economic Complexity (ECI) is the result of a 2010 Master Thesis in Media Arts and Sciences by one Alexander Simoes, and enjoys the continuing support of the MIT Media Lab‘s consortia for undirected research. A history of the project’s contributions is available on Github. Some technical details from the project’s FAQ page:
“Where does the data come from?
“The observatory provides access to bilateral trade data for roughly 200 countries, 50 years and 1000 different products of the SITC4 revision 2 classification. For historical SITC classification data, we use data from The Center for International Data from Robert Feenstra. For up to date HS classification data, we use data provided by UN COMTRADE.
“Can I download this data?
“Sure! You can download the latest dump of the entire data (in MySQL format) here. Or if you are looking for data on a particular country or product, you can click the CSV download button on the right-hand side of all explore pages.”
The rest of the FAQ page lets users know how they can help the project improve by contributing translations, correcting errors, and reporting bugs. Besides the search functionality, there’s a Rankings page listing countries by their current ECI values. The site also offers profiles of different countries’ economic activity. As of this writing, though, I can’t seem to pull up a profile of a specific country, but rather click through a series of what seem like randomly presented entries. An interesting way to kill a few minutes of time, but not so good for finding specific information. If that’s a bug, I hope it’s fixed soon. If it’s a feature… I hope it’s fixed soon.
One more thing to note about this project—it has the potential to inform global policy in ways that make life better around the world. Their book “The Atlas of Economic Complexity: Mapping Paths to Prosperity” makes the case, and is free to download. Said a World Bank chief economist in 2011, “The ECI can play a very important role. It can help identify the role for developing countries.” We do hope the Observatory will live up to its potential.
Cynthia Murrell, March 26, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Up and Down for IBM
March 26, 2014
There is good news and there is bad news for IBM. First up, a real journalist asks difficult questions about their high-profile project in “What’s Up with Watson?” at Gigaom. Writer Barb Darrow begins by noting that IBM likes to hold up its Jeopardy winner as an example of the company’s prowess. However, she explains, the much-lauded project seems to be floundering. There is the fact that its former leader left for newer pastures just four months after touting Watson‘s business potential. Darrow also reports:
“One problem I’ve been hearing about for a while is that while Watson is impressive technology, it is not really a product that’s easy to sell. IBM’s decision to open up APIs, to offer Watson’s smarts as a service, is one response to that. You make Watson available in more affordable portions, maybe it’ll gain traction….
“Sources close to IBM have said privately for some time that Watson has not hit internal targets for new business — no doubt one impetus for the new business unit. One said IBM wanted 100 new ‘logos’— big-name corporate wins in IBM parlance for Watson last year and was only able to close a handful.”
That’s the bad news. Meanwhile, though, the company has launched a contest that both spreads their name and inspires students worldwide (that’s the good news.) We learn that IBM is expanding their Master the Mainframe Contest, begun in 2006, in eWeek‘s “IBM Launches Master the Mainframe World Championship.” Reporter Darryl K. Taft tells us:
“The world championship competition is designed to assemble the best university students from around the globe, who have demonstrated superior technical skills through participation in their regional IBM Master the Mainframe contests….
“Of the 20,000 students who have engaged in country-level Master the Mainframe Contests over the last three years, the top 44 students from 22 countries have been invited to participate in the inaugural IBM Master the Mainframe World Championship.”
The contest is viewed as a way to get millennials excited about enterprise computing. For my part, I hope these young people will breathe some fresh air into the enterprise mainframe. See the article for details, or head over to the official Championship website.
Cynthia Murrell, March 26, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Webinar to Improve SharePoint Document Viewing
March 26, 2014
Webinars are a classic professional development option, but can be especially helpful when needing to brush up on the details and ins and outs of SharePoint. CMS Wire offers a good selection and they will be offering a helpful one today. Read more on their event calendar, “(Webinar) Make SharePoint Document Viewing Easier with HTML 5.”
The overview of the program says:
“By integrating an HTML5 document viewer with SharePoint 2013, you enable your users to easily display almost any document file type right from a SharePoint list, through a consistent, easy-to-use interface with search, annotation, redaction, and DRM tools. Your users don’t need any special software on their devices—all they need is an HTML5 browser, even on mobile—and their documents show up fast, through any connection type.”
This type of upgrade to the document viewer could be really essential in improving user experience for your users. Saving users clicks and helping them stay within SharePoint to open documents means saving them time and improving user satisfaction. Stephen E. Arnold is a longtime follower of search and reports many of his observations on ArnoldIT.com. He finds that a successful SharePoint deployment is one that is efficient and customized, so taking the time to learn and implement tricks like these really do make all the difference.
Emily Rae Aldridge, March 26, 2014
Ami Enterprise Intelligence Software
March 25, 2014
In a routine update process, one of the goslings came across Ami, a company that offered Ami Enterprise Intelligence 6.0. A quick review of the company’s Web site at www.amisw.com suggested that the company’s last update took place in 2013.
The flagship product in at Version 6.0. The company says:
Enterprise intelligence 6 is a platform for economic intelligence. Designed by AMI, [the system] includes separate modules for the acquisition, analysis and dissemination of information from external sources or internal company content. AMI Enterprise Intelligence is recognized by the community of business intelligence professionals as one of the platforms that ensures the most comprehensive and most innovative business intelligence.
In April 2013, just about one year ago, the company suggests that it participated in the International II SDV Conference. However, the link to the news item returns a 404 error.
Links to the company’s technology on its Web site are working as of March 25, 2014. The company lists four US patents for its core technology. The AMI patent portfolio consists of:
- GMIL (Grammatical Markers Independent of Language) (# B-3851)
- Enhancing online support (# B-3561)
- Language Interface Natural (# B-3563)
- Language interface for E-Commerce (# B-3562)
The list on the Ami Web site does not contain hyperlinks, however. The Crunchbase profile for the company and products has not been completed. See, for example, http://bit.ly/1jB16dC.
The company appears to be participating in Documation, March 26 in Paris at CNIT Paris la Défense. See http://bit.ly/1lj1eCV. The company appears to be participating in Documation, March 26 in Paris at CNIT Paris la Défense. See http://bit.ly/1lj1eCV. The company asserts that it has more than 150 customers.
The company, like Lextek, maintains a low profile, although it reports that it has offices in the United Kingdom and Paris.
Stephen E Arnold, March 25, 2014
SharePoint Search: A Very Positive View
March 25, 2014
Navigate to “Dump the File Server: Why We Moved to the SharePoint Online Cloud.” Tucked deep in the bowels of the rosy tipped discussion of Microsoft’s cloud services is this statement:
And the search power in SharePoint is disgustingly accurate, providing the accuracy and file previews that we were used to on Google Drive.
I like that “disgustingly accurate.” Sounds objective to me. Much more meaningful than such silliness as relevance, precision, and recall.
Stephen E Arnold, March 25, 2014
Performance Data for Cloud Computing
March 25, 2014
If you are weighing your cloudy options, InfoWorld has an article for you—”Ultimate Cloud Speed Tests: Amazon vs. Google vs. Windows Azure.” Results? The subtitle gives us the short answer—”A diverse set of real-world Java benchmarks shows Google is fastest, Azure is slowest, and Amazon is priciest.” The long answer takes up several pages, as journalist Peter Wayner shares details of his results. He writes:
“To test out the options available to anyone looking for a server, I rented some machines on Amazon EC2, Google Compute Engine, and Microsoft Windows Azure and took them out for a spin. The good news is that many of the promises have been fulfilled. If you click the right buttons and fill out the right Web forms, you can have root on a machine in a few minutes, sometimes even faster. All of them make it dead simple to get the basic goods: a Linux distro running what you need.
“At first glance, the options seem close to identical. You can choose from many of the same distributions, and from a wide range of machine configuration options. But if you start poking around, you’ll find differences—including differences in performance and cost.”
Naturally, the best choice for each organization depends on more than those basic factors. See the article for the data and patterns Wayner has assembled from his tests. I’ll share a couple of his value-related observations—not only was Google’s service the fastest overall, it was also cheapest overall. There’s a case to be made for Azure’s economy version Small for those on a tight budget, but, Wayner says, “Amazon was rarely a bargain.” Even if your organization is not currently facing this decision, this article is a good one to tuck away for future reference.
Cynthia Murrell, March 25, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Important Book on Networked Youth now Available for Free Download
March 25, 2014
If you wonder how teens are interacting with technology and how it is affecting them, don’t rely on sensationalistic headlines. Boing boing announces that what writer Cory Doctorow calls “the best book about young people and the Internet I’ve read to date” is now available gratis in, “Free Download of danah boyd’s Must-Read Book ‘It’s Complicated.'” While boyd is more interested in spreading her information than in making a profit, she also recognizes that purchasing a book signals to others that its message is important. To that end, she does encourage us to buy the book if we can, even if we enjoy it in free pdf form first.
Over a decade, boyd carefully researched the subject and found that society’s dismay over the Internet’s influence on youth is unwarranted. Doctorow’s review of the book reveals:
“In eight brisk chapters—thoroughly backstopped by a long and fascinating collection of end-notes—boyd tackles the moral panics of networks and kids, and places them in wider social and historical contexts. She systematically, relentlessly punctures easy stories about how kids don’t value privacy; whether the Internet holds special danger of sexual predators; the reality of bullying; the absurdity of ‘Internet addiction’ and the real story of ‘digital natives’ and the important and eminently fixable gaps in kids’ network literacy.
“boyd is not a blind optimist. She is alive to the risks and dangers of networks; but she is also cognizant of the new opportunities and the relief from other social problems (such as hysteria over the presence of kids in public places; sexism, racism, homophobia and slut-shaming; the merciless overscheduling and academic pressure on adolescents) and the immense power of networks to enable advocacy, agency and activism.”
Don’t buy the hype, buy the book. Or at least take boyd up on her offer and read the free version. As we shed reflexive hysteria and delve into complex reality, we should remember that anxiety over the ways of younger generations is perpetual. Roleplaying games, comic books, rock ‘n’ roll, and even paperbacks all took their turns as targets of elder scorn.
Cynthia Murrell, March 25, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Balance Big Data with Human Cognition
March 25, 2014
An example from the world of professional cricket illustrates the dangers of relying too much on data and too little on human intuition. ReadWrite tells us “How Big Data Fails to Make Big Plays in Sports.” Writer Matt Asay describes what went wrong when England’s data-smitten cricket coach lead his team to a striking defeat against Austrailia earlier this year.
The article recounts a strategy based on analysis of data from previous matches, one that left no wiggle room for shifting factors and certainly no tolerance for hunches. The result—a humiliating 5-0 defeat. Asay goes on to extrapolate the lesson to business decisions. He writes:
“Data complements decisions, but shouldn’t rule them, because data is never truly objective. Choosing which data to collect is a human judgment—so, too, are the questions we ask of it. Still, data need not always be subservient to human intuition. At my company, for example, we recently found through extensive A/B testing that our best guesses as to which email subject lines would be most effective were way off. We therefore calibrated our email campaign to match the data, not our intuition. This is where data comes in handy: measuring one’s intuition for accuracy. But it also serves to inform that same intuition, so that our next ‘best guess’ is more likely to succeed. In the case of England’s cricket team, rather than respond to data, coach Flowers was bowled over by it, sticking to data even when it clearly wasn’t paying off in wins. In sport or business, that’s what we call ‘a losing strategy.'”
Technology is great and all, but it is important to remember that it has its limitations. We are still a very long way from building a machine that can compare with the human brain, Watson notwithstanding. Heck, we don’t even fully understand that magnificent apparatus we’re born with. As big data just keeps getting bigger, the adage “trust your instincts” deserves to be reiterated.
Cynthia Murrell, March 25, 2014
Sponsored by ArnoldIT.com, developer of Augmentext
Crafting a Customized Search Application to SharePoint
March 25, 2014
A lot of organizations will hire an outside company to customize and implement their SharePoint infrastructure. Others are big enough to have staff onsite devoted to building and maintaining SharePoint. However, either way there are many individuals who have a vested interest in creating customized SharePoint components. Search Content Management covers one “how-to” in their article, “Building a SharePoint 2013 Search-Based Application.”
The article describes its objective:
“While this article doesn’t have the space to cover all aspects of how to build a Microsoft SharePoint 2013 search-based application, we will provide an overview. The key components are list and library structures to store content; metadata and metadata sources, including the Managed Metadata Service; search to crawl the content; user interface elements to surface the content and display templates to render the content with the required formatting.”
Stephen E. Arnold is a longtime follower of all things search, including SharePoint, on his Web site ArnoldIT.com. He focuses on the reality of the situation – how users can get the most out of search solutions. For SharePoint, he often finds that customization is key; so building unique components like this could be the difference between a frustrating deployment and a well-used and well-loved solution.
Emily Rae Aldridge, March 25, 2014
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